David Edward Jackson was an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 pioneer, explorer, trader, and fur trapper.

He spent his early life west of the Shenandoah Mountains

Shenandoah Mountains

Shenandoah Mountain is a mountain ridge approximately long in Virginia and West Virginia. The steep, narrow, sandstone-capped ridge extends from northern Bath County, Virginia to southern Hardy County, West Virginia...

, in what was then part of Virginia

Virginia

The Commonwealth of Virginia , is a U.S. state on the Atlantic Coast of the Southern United States. Virginia is nicknamed the "Old Dominion" and sometimes the "Mother of Presidents" after the eight U.S. presidents born there...

 and is now in West Virginia

West Virginia

West Virginia is a state in the Appalachian and Southeastern regions of the United States, bordered by Virginia to the southeast, Kentucky to the southwest, Ohio to the northwest, Pennsylvania to the northeast and Maryland to the east...

: he was born in Randolph County

Randolph County, West Virginia

As of the census of 2000, there were 28,262 people, 11,072 households, and 7,661 families residing in the county. The population density was 27 people per square mile . There were 13,478 housing units at an average density of 13 per square mile...

, and his parents, Edward and Elizabeth Jackson, soon moved the family west to Lewis County

Lewis County, West Virginia

As of the census of 2000, there were 16,919 people, 6,946 households, and 4,806 families residing in the county. The population density was 44 people per square mile . There were 7,944 housing units at an average density of 21 per square mile...

, on the Cumberland Plateau

Cumberland Plateau

The Cumberland Plateau is the southern part of the Appalachian Plateau. It includes much of eastern Kentucky and western West Virginia, part of Tennessee, and a small portion of northern Alabama and northwest Georgia . The terms "Allegheny Plateau" and the "Cumberland Plateau" both refer to the...

.

He was one of those who opened the Oregon Trail

Oregon Trail

The Oregon Trail is a historic east-west wagon route that connected the Missouri River to valleys in Oregon and locations in between.After 1840 steam-powered riverboats and steamboats traversing up and down the Ohio, Mississippi and Missouri rivers sped settlement and development in the flat...

 having explored many connecting valleys in his life as a trapper. By 1826 Jackson bought a majority position in the three year old Rocky Mountain Fur Company

Rocky Mountain Fur Company

The Rocky Mountain Fur Company, sometimes called Ashley's Hundred, was organized in St. Louis, Missouri in 1823 by General William H. Ashley and Major Andrew Henry . They posted advertisements in St. Louis newspapers seeking "One Hundred enterprising young men . ....

, and along with several partners, prospered while the fur bearing beavers remained plentiful; which populations began a quick decline ca. 1833, presumably from over trapping. group=notes>There were too many companies taking pelts, and too little time for breeding pairs to propagate big families. In part, the nature of beavers was at fault; the animals instinctively migrate to new undammed, heavily forested stream beds, and avoid old damns. The effect of trapping a breeding pair was to cause an interruption in beaver population that took years to recoup until the region regenerated its tree stocks and new migrant beavers re-established a locales numbers.


Jackson Hole

Jackson Hole

Jackson Hole, originally called Jackson's Hole, is a valley located in the U.S. state of Wyoming, near the western border with Idaho. The name "hole" derives from language used by early trappers or mountain men, who primarily entered the valley from the north and east and had to descend along...

 in Wyoming

Wyoming

Wyoming is a state in the mountain region of the Western United States. The western two thirds of the state is covered mostly with the mountain ranges and rangelands in the foothills of the Eastern Rocky Mountains, while the eastern third of the state is high elevation prairie known as the High...

is named for him.

Further reading

• LeRor R. Hafen, editor, Mountain Men & Fur Traders of the Far West, 1965-72 (10 volumes).

Jackson, John C., Shadow on the Tetons: David E. Jackson and the claiming of the American West, Missoula: Mountain Press Publishing Co., 1993.

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